Hardly anyone talks of the table of virtues and vices anymore — which includes the Seven Deadly Sins — but in reviewing them, we find that they nicely sum up the foundation of bourgeois ethics, and provide a solid moral critique of the modern state.

Now, libertarians don’t often talk about virtues and vices, mainly because we agree with Lysander Spooner that vices are not crimes, and that the law ought only to address the latter. At the same time, we do need to observe that vices and virtues — and our conception of what constitutes proper behavior and culture generally — have a strong bearing on the rise and decline of freedom.

Let me illustrate. A speaker at a Mises Institute conference two years ago was explaining how problems of welfare, charity, and support for the poor could be handled through voluntary means — that is, through philanthropy. His explanation was brilliant, but a hand shot up.

A student from India had a question. What if, he said, one lives in a society in which the religion says that a person’s lot in life is dictated by God, and thus it would be sin to change it in any way. The poor, in this view, are supposed to be poor, and to help them would violate God’s will. In fact, a charitable person is committing a crime against God.

The speaker stood there in stunned silence. The students around the room looked at the questioner with their mouths open. We were all amazed to confront a reality too often ignored; namely, that the ethics undergirding our culture, which we so often take for granted, are essential to the functioning of what we call the good society, based on the dignity of the individual, and the possibility of progress, freedom, and prosperity.

In our country and in our times, a productive free-market economy, one supported by a strong sense of personal responsibility and a moral commitment to the security of property rights, has one great enemy: the interventionist state. It is the state that taxes, regulates, and inflates, distorting a system that would otherwise operate smoothly, productively, and to the great benefit of all, generating wealth, security, and peace, and creating the conditions necessary for the flourishing of everything we call civilization.

The name that Karl Marx gave to this system was capitalism, because he believed that the free market was the system that empowered the owners of capital — the bourgeoisie — at the expense of the workers and peasants of the proletarian class.

The name capitalism is somewhat misleading, because free enterprise is not, in fact, a system of economics organized for the sole benefit of the property-owning classes. And yet, the advocates of free markets have not been entirely unhappy with having to use the term capitalism, precisely because capital ownership and accumulation is indeed the engine that drives the operation of a productive free market.

While the system works not to the sole benefit of the capitalists, it is certainly true that private ownership of the means of production, and the creation of this class of citizens, are crucial for us to enjoy all the glories of a productive economy to bestow themselves on society.

Along with the creation of this class comes the formation of what are called bourgeois ethics — a term used derisively to describe the habitual ways of the business class. Hard-core Marxists still use the phrase as if it described the exploiter class. More commonly, it is used by intellectuals to identify a kind of white-bread sameness and predictability that lacks an appreciation for the avant-garde.

Usually it is used to describe people who have an affection for hometown, faith, and family, and a suspicion of lifestyle experiments and behaviors that skirt commonly accepted cultural norms. But those who use the term derisively are not generally appreciative of the extent to which bourgeois ethics make possible the lifestyle of all classes, including the intellectual class.

The bourgeoisie is a class of savers and contract keepers, people who are concerned for the future more than the present, people with an attachment to family. This class of people cares more for their children’s welfare, and for work and productivity, than for leisure and personal indulgence.

The virtues of the bourgeoisie are the traditional virtues of prudence, justice, temperance, and fortitude. Each has an economic component — many economic components in fact.

Prudence supports the institution of saving, the desire to get a good education to prepare for the future, and the hope to pass on an inheritance to our children.

With justice comes the desire to keep contracts, to tell the truth in business dealings, and to provide compensation to those who have been wronged.

With temperance comes the desire to restrain oneself, to work before play, which shows that prosperity and freedom are ultimately supported by an internal discipline.

With fortitude comes the entrepreneurial impulse to set aside inordinate fear and to forge ahead when faced with life’s uncertainties. These virtues are the foundation of the bourgeoisie, and the basis of great civilizations.

But the mirror image of these virtues shows how the virtuous mode of human behavior finds its opposite in public policies employed by the modern state. The state sets itself against bourgeois ethics and undermines them, and the decline of bourgeois ethics allows the state to expand at the expense of both freedom and virtue.

In the Western religious tradition, the Seven Deadly Sins are not the only ones. They are called the deadly ones because in traditional teaching, they result in spiritual death. Let’s take each one in turn.

Vainglory

This is also called pride, or, more precisely, excessive or disproportionate pride. We know what it means for a person to be excessively vainglorious or prideful. It means that he puts his interests before that of anyone else, even if doing so may cause harm to another. It is the overestimation of the worth of oneself and one’s interests and entitlements at the expense of others.

In public policy, we can think of many pressure groups who believe their interests are more important than anyone else’s. In fact, this trait of vainglory describes the appalling clamor for all sorts of new rights. We have disability lobbyists who believe they are entitled to violate everyone else’s property rights and freedom for their own sake.

The same is true of many groups identified by various racial and sexual categories. They are convinced by their own pride to believe that they are owed special privileges. The rule of law and its equal application becomes distorted by the demands of the few against the many.

This is hardly the route to long-term social peace. Consider the issue of discrimination in hiring. Why anyone would want to work for an employer who does not really want to hire him is beyond me. In a competitive market, employers are permitted to discriminate, but the costs of discriminatory hiring are wholly born by the employer, whose success or failure is determined by the consumer.

Because employers are in competition with each other, everyone can find a place for himself within the vast network of the division of labor. The pride that leads to short-circuiting this process is not in the long-term interests of society.

The same is true of nations. There is nothing wrong with having a natural and normal pride in one’s nation. But to be vainglorious and to overestimate the merit of one’s nation can have bad economic effects. Among these bad effects may be chauvinism and belligerence in foreign affairs, as well as mercantilism in international trade policy.

If, for example, we are so convinced that American steel is so much better than foreign steel that we must punish any foreigner who would attempt to sell us steel, we are guilty of vainglory. We are also doing ourselves economic harm by forcing consumers of steel — at all stages of production — to pay higher prices for lesser quality steel than would prevail in a free market.

This is an unsustainable state of affairs. Any industry that is protected from competition becomes ever less efficient. The nation that comes to practice this form of mercantilism can end up producing all sorts of things inefficiently, and displacing new lines of production that would be efficient but are not being undertaken.

Pride in public policy can result in a failure to use critical intelligence in assessing our system of government. We might say, for example, that the United states is the greatest nation on earth. But does that mean that our tax and regulatory polices are what they should be, and that to criticize them is somehow anti-American? Not by any means. To say so is to be guilty of vainglory.

The truth is that the US system of government is gravely flawed and woefully contrary to most of what the founders hoped to bring about when they set up a new government.

The framers never imagined such a thing as the monstrous Department of Homeland Security, or an income tax, or a Federal Reserve, or a far-flung military empire that spends more than most of the world’s other nations combined.

These institutions and the change of public-policy culture generally have created the most vainglorious state in the history of the world, especially under the leadership of the current president, whose speeches and statements give new meaning to the word messianic.

Anger

Western civilization over the last 2,000 years has regarded anger as a grave vice because it leads to destruction rather than peace and productivity. Thus the institution of courts in domestic affairs and diplomacy in foreign affairs.

But in our own country, the taboo against anger in public affairs came to be violated, in particular by the war crimes of federal armies during the civil war. Civilians were deliberately targeted. Homes were looted, crops were burned, livestock killed. This was an expression of anger.

The institutionalization of anger has persisted ever since, in massacres of civilians in the Philippines, in the hunger blockade of World War I, in the bombing of cities in World War II, in the destruction of churches in the war on Serbia, and in the war on Iraq, 11 years running.

When officials say they are angry and plan to unleash Hell on some foreign country, they are partaking in this deadly vice, which also has cultural effects.

The man who was behind the bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building developed his taste for violent anger during the first Gulf War. Many of the killers who have shot up public schools were later revealed to be obsessed with military means and wars.

What lesson is the current generation learning from the speeches and attitudes of the current ruling class and its taste for blood? I shudder to think.

The modern military arsenal, combined with a shredding of all restraints on what is permissible and impermissible in warfare, has unleashed the angry state on the world. Its relentless mode in foreign policy is vengeance, and its main product is human suffering and death.

Envy

Again, this is a word hardly heard anymore. Envy is not the same as jealousy. Jealousy is merely wishing that you enjoyed the same property and status as another. Envy means the desire to harm someone else solely because he enjoys some quality, virtue, or possession, and you do not. It is the desire to destroy the success or good fortune of another.

In the current round of corporation bashing, I fear the unleashing of envy against people because of their personal accomplishments. And we see the work of envy in the redistributionist welfare state.

Some people say that what matters most is not that the welfare state helps the poor but rather that it hurts the rich. So too with the inheritance tax, which collects relatively little revenue, but does grave damage to would-be family dynasties.

How many Congressional speeches against the business class and the rich are driven by this deadly sin? All too many. Antitrust policy that seeks to smash a business solely because it is big and successful is a working out of envy. I recall an article by Michael Kinsley several years ago in Slate magazine that honestly asked the question: what is wrong with envy?

Nothing, he concluded. In fact, he rightly observed, it is the foundation of much modern public policy. Even so, it is a deadly sin. It is one that will destroy society if it is fully unleashed. And nowhere is it more relentlessly unleashed than within the culture of the state itself, which attacks success in business and private life in every way.

A century ago, many private dynasties had more wealth at their disposal than the federal government. Would the modern Envy State tolerate such a thing? Not likely. All wealth apart from the state’s own is up for grabs, but particularly dynastic wealth.

Covetousness

The related sin of desiring to grasp what belongs to another, through whatever means one can assemble, is also socially harmful. Through taxation and welfare programs, the state is effectively blessing the sin of covetousness.

Now, let us be clear. To covet something is not the same as an innocent desire to improve one’s lot in life. This is a good impulse, one that drives people to succeed. Covetousness is different because it cares nothing for the means used to achieve one’s goals.

Instead of productive exchange, covetousness resorts to theft, whether private theft or public theft that uses the government. We saw covetousness turn to a public clamor after the collapse in stock prices in 2000 and following, when the public demanded that the Fed do something to stop their investments from going belly-up.

Here again, we see the desire for money outstrip the moral consideration of how precisely this money is to be acquired. And the more the state feeds the sin of covetousness, the more of it we are likely to see, and the more bourgeois ethics fall into disuse.

The modern state is nothing if not covetous. It has its gaze constantly fixed on our liberty, privacy, wealth, and independence, and desires to take through any means possible. In the covetous state, liberty is always declining, the percentage of wealth subject to taxation always growing, and the ability for institutions and individuals to thrive apart from government blessing always in doubt.

Gluttony

We think of gluttony as solely related to eating. But it can also mean the excessive desire for comfort, luxury, and leisure at the expense of work and productivity. Senior citizens’ lobbies, when they demand that the public provide comfy living for all septuagenarians at the expense of young workers, are playing into the deadly sin of gluttony.

The problem doesn’t only afflict seniors. It is a problem among the poor, who have been conditioned by the welfare state to believe they are entitled to live well without earning their money. Interestingly, rates of obesity among the poor far outstrip those among the bourgeoisie.

The pervasiveness of gluttony also shows up in the appalling consumer debt load. This implies a desire to consume now regardless of the later consequences. The gluttonous consumer cares nothing about the long term, only that his appetite is satisfied today.

The Federal Reserve encourages this deadly sin through loose credit policies and bailouts, which create the illusion that there is no downside to living for the present at the expense of the future. So too with the policy of inflation, which encourages us to spend money today because it will have less buying power tomorrow. Inflation institutionalizes the sin of gluttony and makes it appear rational.

It only takes a quick look at a detailed map of Washington, DC, to see the ultimate display of gluttony, for land, money, and power. From the point of view of the state, it never has enough land, money, and power. It eats and eats, grows ever fatter, and you take a risk in merely pointing this out.

Sloth

The story of how the welfare state has created a slothful class is an old one, hardly disputed anymore, but no less true. The promise of something for nothing at others’ expense has corrupted the poor, but also the aged and another group as well: students between the ages of 18 and 25.

On the aged, it is pathetic to see how a class of people that should be leading society with wisdom and through experience, to the highest ideals, has become a grasping group of vacationers with ever more time on their hands. Let us be clear: in a free society, there is no right to retirement, and certainly no right to a comfortable retirement. The concept itself was invented by the late New Deal. Before then, sloth was something to be purchased with one’s own money. Now, one can enjoy it via the tax state.

As for students, our school system has socialized them into believing that the more official credentials one earns, the more one has the right to extract from society, a payment in return for blessing the world with one’s mere presence. Talk to anyone who is in the hiring business these days. He will tell you that it is extremely rare to find a young person who understands that employment is not a tribute paid but an exchange of work for wages. All these trends are worse in Europe, where school welfare is more generous — but we are catching up.

The subsidization of sloth creates a vicious circle. The more the state rewards not working, the less people have by way of personal and financial resources to live independently from the state. The slothful are naturally inclined to develop dependencies, which is exactly the way the state likes it.

Meanwhile, consider the slothfulness of the state itself. There is no more risk-averse class than the bureaucratic one. Whether it is in the FDA process of approving drugs or the loan-application department at HUD, getting bureaucrats to work is like getting hogs to run a race.

Some years ago, a federal bureaucrat sent us the following article, to which he refused to attach his name. It noted,

What draws people to government work? What keeps them there for a lifetime? It’s simple: overcompensation, huge benefits, and great working conditions. It’s attractive to sign up and nearly impossible to leave…. What would I lose if I left the government? The short work week would be out the window…. Right now, I can spend 8.7 percent of my work time on vacation. That’s six weeks per year in perpetuity…. I could also forget about the unofficial "bennies": for example, I take an hour-long jog every day, followed by a shower and a leisurely lunch. It keeps me in tip-top condition for my vacations. And shopping excursions during work are always possible. What about stress? If relaxation lengthened life, bureaucrats would live to be 150 years old.

And yet, in this one area, perhaps we should be grateful. The only thing worse than the slothful state is an energized one that awakes early to take away our liberty.

Lust

This is thought of as a personal problem only. But we see its destructiveness at work in any government policy that fails to appreciate the family as the foundation of bourgeois society. In public life today, we pretend as if the family is dispensable, when it is the essential bulwark between the individual and the state.

Thoughtful economists like Ludwig von Mises and Joseph Schumpeter saw that the family is the training ground for the ethics of capitalism. It is here where we learn about the evil of theft and to respect others’ property, to save and to plan for the future, to keep our word.

It is no accident that Marxists have long sought to smash the family as an institution, and reduce all of society to atomistic individuals who lack the resources to provide security for themselves and who inevitably turn to the state, instead of parents and kin, for help.

These are the Seven Deadly Sins, and in each case, and in a hundred ways I have not mentioned, current government policy encourages them at the expense of bourgeois ethics, which are the ethics of a free market, of a society that is productive, peaceful, and secure from arbitrary power.

Why do we hear so little of the Seven Deadly Sins? Perhaps because no institution is more gluttonous, covetous, prideful, or angry than the state itself. In the private sector, market institutions correct these abuses over time. In the state, with no market test and no check on unethical behavior, these deadly sins thrive with a vengeance.

I am by no means despairing of the future of the bourgeoisie. If there were a danger that this class could be destroyed, 60 or so years of government policy designed to kill it would have accomplished its goal by now.

And yet, we should not become complacent. To the same degree that so many current political struggles are reduced to a conflict of cultures, our best means of fighting back is to live and practice bourgeois ethics in our homes, communities, and businesses.

Let us instead recall the four great bourgeois virtues of prudence, justice, temperance, and fortitude, and, in doing so, do our part to build freedom and prosperity, even in our times. May we never take these cultural foundations of our civilization for granted.

Post from: LibertarianChristians.com

The Sinful State

I might consider myself a Libertarian, except I just can’t get over that so many libertarians are atheists and against all religious expression by government. For instance, Libertarians hate Mike Huckabee for some fear of a “theocracy.” How do you address these things about your secular libertarian friends (such as Ayn Rand types)?

This question has multiple levels, and thus I want to wade carefully through the various issues wrapped in it. First off, just because there are plenty of atheist libertarians does not mean that it is a political philosophy only for atheists. On the contrary, I would argue that Christianity has lots in common with libertarianism and very little in common with statism. A philosophy that is essentially founded upon “treat others the way you want to be treated” would naturally see Christianity as favorable. See my Lessons in Liberty article for more.

As for religious expression by governments, Christian libertarians do not want to see government taking on vestments of Christianity whatsoever for two reasons: (1) the State is founded in rebellion to God and it should not be covered in Christian garb to look better than it is. We should always look to expose the State’s evils rather than “baptize” it to gain benefits; and (2) the Church universal needs to be internally protected from the trappings of the State in order to stay pure. The more governments get wrapped up in Christianity, the worse it will be for the Church.

I wouldn’t say that libertarians “hate” Huckabee because they fear theocracy (hate is a strong word anyway). Still, there is much to despise in his politics. Huckabee is a warmonger, pro-big government, pro-drug war, economically illiterate, anti-free market, anti-immigrant, and a supporter of the police state. If he supports these things because he thinks that’s what God wants, then he’s completely off his rocker and that’s worth criticizing in its own right.

I have many non-Christian, libertarian friends. Some of them love Ayn Rand, some don’t. But I have rarely had any issue in sharing my faith or dealing with sensitive topics because we have a common desire to treat others with respect. Here’s the bottom line: liberty brings people together. Libertarians come from all over the belief spectrum, but the commonality of seeking liberty transcends boundaries. As a result, you have many opportunities to live out the gospel to those around you.

********

He concluded with a statement that kind of begs a response:

Also, I can’t get over how so many Libertarians (probably not you guys) are like Barney frank on social issues but Jim DeMint on fiscal issues.

Christian libertarians do not believe that you can solve moral problems through legislation. Insofar as law exists, we seek to reduce its grasp on individual action that is not aggressive in nature. Instead, we want to use the power of social change, leveraged through the Church and local communities, to fix such problems.

Libertarians understand that the government cannot do anything right for an economy. Thus, if the government is to exist at all, it should not involve itself in anything other than the protection of basic property rights. (And many libertarians, myself included, think the State cannot even protect rights without becoming corrupt!) Hence, the government should abolish all income and property taxes and not involve itself in trade whatsoever.

Besides that, Jim DeMint is not a great example of someone being “libertarian” on fiscal issues. If you’re going to look anywhere in Congress, look to Ron Paul!

Have a question you’d like to ask? Submit yours here.

Post from: LibertarianChristians.com

Government and Religious Expression

How would the statements by the Apostles Paul and Peter (in Romans 13:1-7, Titus 3:1, and 1 Peter 2:13-17) have differed if they had been modern day Americans rather than living under the Roman state? The study of history, economics, political science, world religions, literary forms, and philosophy are important for proper biblical interpretation. Without a good grasp of these fields of endeavor, the interpreter is prone to make errors in judgment, including errors in applying the doctrinal rules regarding submission to authority under a modern “democracy” (or republic) rather than an autocracy.

For instance, the synoptic gospel accounts say that the death of Christ occurred at the “sixth hour” (Matthew 27:45; Mark 15:33; Luke 23:44), while John 19:14 says that He was still with Pilate at that time. How can one reconcile the difference in time? Is the discrepancy proof that the Bible contains errors? By applying knowledge from fields such and history along with deductive reasoning, one will find that John’s Gospel was written much later than the other three accounts—after the fall of Jerusalem in 70AD. That cataclysmic event crushed, among other things, the Jewish manner of keeping time. For a Jew, a day began at 6AM instead of midnight (the latter being both the Roman convention and ours today). Thus, in Jewish time the sixth hour corresponded to noon in Roman time. John would have used Roman time in his gospel and so there is no contradiction in the Bible. Accordingly, biblical interpretation can be facilitated and enhanced by careful utilization of the tools from other disciplines.

That is not to say that all doctrines of the Bible require tools from disciplines like the sciences or the humanities to be well understood. In particular, the doctrine of salvation and the nature and attributes of God may be clearly manifest to even the most uninformed reader. But some theology and specific doctrine requires hard work to flesh out appropriately—including the use of analytical tools and knowledge gleaned from other disciplines. Thus, a good grasp of economics, public policy theory, and history are a great boon in developing a biblical theology of public policy.

The political context of the Apostles differed greatly from the situation of the modern West. Not only do most Western nations not have an autocratic state, the rules of interventionism have changed. Rome had no welfare state. This fact is important for Christians because welfarism is based on the notion of “positive rights”. This political philosophy justifies plundering one group of citizens in order to benefit another, and is therefore an abomination to the Christian faith.

Would the Apostles have encouraged modern Christians in the West to participate in welfare state programs or employment schemes? If we take the Scriptural admonitions against theft seriously, the answer must be “No”. The Bible clearly prohibits theft: “You shall not steal, nor deal falsely, nor lie to one another” (Leviticus 19:11), “You shall not steal” (Exodus 20:15; Matthew 19:18, Romans 13:9), “Let him 3 who stole steal no longer” (Ephesians 4:28a); and it forbids idleness: “If anyone will not work, neither shall he eat” (1 Thessalonians 3:10).

The fact that the state legalizes plunder through extortive taxation policy does not justify the theft, nor does the state’s rewarding of idleness excuse complacent joblessness. Recipients may not receive welfare and be innocent any more than a woman or her abortion “doctor” can be guiltless of murder when performing a “legal” abortion. How can a Christian rightly contend that the Apostles would have contradicted their teaching against theft by allowing looting through the political process? The bottom line is that a Christian cannot be righteous while voluntarily requesting welfare state benefits like Social Security, Aid to Families with Dependent Children, food stamps, educational grants, or subsidized housing.

Furthermore, the existence of democratic processes under a constitutional republic does not alter the malevolent nature of proactive public policies or the bad behavior of government agents. Representative government does not preclude Christians from championing causes against bad legislation, evil decrees, or nefarious rulers. Neither does it prevent them from disobeying foul edicts. There is nothing in Scripture that would lead one to believe that state-sponsored extortion or state-sanctioned murder (e.g., abortion and euthanasia) are cleansed (or are no longer wrong) because they have been approved through a representative process. And it is inconsistent for Christian leaders to arbitrarily decry abortion policy but not extortion policies.

The Apostles simply did not envision (and could not have imagined) Christian submission to the state entailing us Christians voluntarily participating in thefts, murders, unjustified aggression, fraud, or malice. Had the Apostles been able to foresee what would transpire under modern “democracies” in the name of “the general welfare” or the “public interest”, they would have both condemned the policies as evil and certainly discouraged Christian participation in them. Further, the Apostles would have doubtless called believers to be those who stand up against such evil policies, whenever prudent, as a matter of maintaining integrity in their Christian lifestyles and their commitment to the Truth. Nowadays pastors and church leaders, rather than Apostles, are left with the charge of calling Christians to maintain integrity. The big question is: “Are they willing to do so?”

Originally published in The Times Examiner on June 15, 2005.

Post from: LibertarianChristians.com

What would the Twelve Apostles say about modern government?

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StopAustinScanners.org calls to action all supporters of civil liberties today!

There are two bills in the Texas House of Representatives right now that need our help. First, the bill proposing to ban body scanners (HB 1938) has the votes in committee to be moved to the floor, and likely has a supermajority to pass the house on its first reading, but it appears that it is being bottled up in committee under pressure from the speaker.

The "pat-down" bill (HB 1937) is currently tied up in the calendar committee for similar reasons.

We need YOU to do two things TODAY:

(1) Call and email the Calendars Committee and tell them to place HB 1937 (the “pat-down” bill) on the Calendar for a House vote.

(2) Call and email the Transportation Committee and demand for a committee vote on HB 1938 (the “scanner” bill) immediately!

Below, we have provided for you the names, phone numbers, and email addresses for the committees. It is ABSOLUTELY CRITICAL to do something TODAY. If you had time to read this email, you have time to email everyone on this list. You can even cut-and-paste the emails in the comma-separated list below so that you can email them all at once.

We also encourage you to use our fantastic Write Your Representatives Tool (http://stopaustinscanners.org/write/state-legislature/) at StopAustinScanners.org to email-blast every single representative and senator in the state of Texas all at once. Please take five minutes and use this amazing resource.

Calendars Committee:

• Todd Hunter (Chair)(REP) 512-463-0672, todd.hunter@house.state.tx.us
• Dennis H Bonnen (Vice Chair) (REP) 512-463-0564, dennis.bonnen@house.state.tx.us
• Dan Branch (REP) 512-463-0367, dan.branch@house.state.tx.us
• Garnet Coleman (DEM) 512-463-0524, garnet.coleman@house.state.tx.us
• Byron C. Cook (REP) 512-463-0730, byron.cook@house.state.tx.us
• Charlie L. Geren (REP) 512-463-0610, charlie.geren@house.state.tx.us
• James L. Keffer (REP) 512-463-0656, jim.keffer@house.state.tx.us
• Tracy O. King (DEM) 512-463-0194, tracy.king@house.state.tx.us
• Lois W. Kolkhorst (REP) 512-463-0600, lois.kolkorst@house.state.tx.us
• Eddie Lucio III (DEM) 512-463-0606, eddie.lucio@house.state.tx.us
• Allan B. Ritter (REP) 512-463-0706, allan.ritter@house.state.tx.us
• Eddie Rodriguez (DEM) 512-463-0674, eddie.rodriguez@house.state.tx.us
• Burt R. Solomons (REP) 512-463-0478, burt.solomons@house.state.tx.us
• Vicki Truitt (REP) 512-463-0690, vicki.truitt@house.state.tx.us
• John Zerwas (REP) 512-463-0657, john.zerwas@house.state.tx.us

Comma-separated email list for Calendars Committee: todd.hunter@house.state.tx.us, dennis.bonnen@house.state.tx.us, dan.branch@house.state.tx.us, garnet.coleman@house.state.tx.us, byron.cook@house.state.tx.us, charlie.geren@house.state.tx.us, jim.keffer@house.state.tx.us, tracy.king@house.state.tx.us, lois.kolkorst@house.state.tx.us, eddie.lucio@house.state.tx.us, allan.ritter@house.state.tx.us, eddie.rodriguez@house.state.tx.us, burt.solomons@house.state.tx.us, vicki.truitt@house.state.tx.us, john.zerwas@house.state.tx.us

Transportation Committee:

• Larry Phillips (Chair) (REP) 512-463-0297, larry.phillips@house.state.tx.us
• Drew Darby (Vice Chair)(REP) 512-463-0331, drew.darby@house.state.tx.us
• Dennis H Bonnen (REP) 512-463-0564, dennis.bonnen@house.state.tx.us 
• Yvonne Davis (DEM) 512-463-0598, yvonne.davis@house.state.tx.us,
• Allen Fletcher (REP) 512-463-0661, allen.fletcher@house.state.tx.us,
• Linda Harper-Brown (REP) 512-463-0641, linda.harper_brown@house.state.tx.us,
• George Lavender (REP) 512-463-0692, george.lavender@house.state.tx.us,
• Armando A. Martinez (DEM) 512-463-0530, armando.martinez@house.state.tx.us,
• Ruth Jones McClendon (DEM) 512-463-0708, ruth.mcclendon@house.state.tx.us,
• Joseph C. Pickett (DEM) 512-463-0596, joe.pickett@house.state.tx.us,
• Eddie Rodriguez (DEM) 512-463-0674, eddie.rodriguez@house.state.tx.us,

Comma-separated email list for Transportation Committee: larry.phillips@house.state.tx.us, drew.darby@house.state.tx.us, dennis.bonnen@house.state.tx.us, yvonne.davis@house.state.tx.us, allen.fletcher@house.state.tx.us, linda.harper_brown@house.state.tx.us, george.lavender@house.state.tx.us, armando.martinez@house.state.tx.us, ruth.mcclendon@house.state.tx.us, joe.pickett@house.state.tx.us, eddie.rodriguez@house.state.tx.us,

Post from: LibertarianChristians.com

Action Alert: Support measures to criminalize TSA abuses TODAY

I found this post [on Satan and the State] to be quite thought-provoking, so much so that I wrote a blog post on it dealing specifically with Romans 13.  Since your post inspired mine, I thought it fair to offer you a chance to repost it, if you so desire.

In closing, let me just say that I enjoy reading your blog because I know that what I read here will be informative and intellectually stimulating.

Yours,
Simon

Read Simon’s take on Romans 13 and the State.

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LCC readers get the point

The evil nature of the state is clearly manifested by the carnage of totalitarian and communist regimes during the twentieth century. Professor Rudolph Rummel has demonstrated in his book Death By Government that, in the twentieth century alone, states around the world were responsible for the killings of an estimated 350 million of their own civilian, non-combatant populations. This figure does not count the more than one billion slain by state-sanctioned abortion worldwide, or the 40 million military personnel slain through state-sponsored aggression, during the same period. The state has been the most lethal institution in human history. And history illustrates the fact that twentieth century states have been the most evil of all time in terms of (1) loss of life and property and (2) the persecution of the church.

Clearly, the state has been more lethal than any infectious disease, plague, or religious inquisition in the history of mankind. In a July 1997 interview with Ideas on Liberty, Rummel stated: “Concentrated political power is the most dangerous thing on earth. During the twentieth century, 14 regimes murdered over a million people” each. “So much for the notion of state benevolence. Powerful states can be like gangs, stealing, raping, torturing, and killing on a whim.”

Many Christians have been murdered by states, including Jesus Christ and nearly all of the Apostles. Yet the relatively peaceful, anomalous American experience has stymied American Christians from appreciating this fact. The truth of the matter is that states have proven to be destructive to property and a great nuisance to the church and gospel preaching. Christian leaders would do well to be better apprised of history (especially as it relates to states and public policy) and basic economics. When it comes to facing unmitigated state power, ignorance is not bliss.

State evil is likewise evident from the poisoned and baneful redistributive policies of modern welfare states, the confiscatory taxation used to accomplish proactive policy, and much moral blight—such as the condoning of manic abortion or the excesses of the Clinton administration in America. Moreover, the imperialistic, unjust, and unconstitutional wars in Iraq and Afghanistan conducted by Bush family presidencies prove that there has been no end to the bloodthirsty quest for power and economic benefit by American rulers.

Even in America, civil liberties and constitutional rights are frequently eroded by all branches of the state, through court cases undermining private property and the right to life, legislation curtailing the Bill of Rights—under the guise of “fighting terrorism” or warring against vices like drug trafficking, and executive orders that encourage police state brutality and barbarism. Thus, the United States of America is fast devolving to the equilibrium point of interventionism and “security” that humans have coddled for centuries. In doing so, citizen-subjects fail to realize the deadly outcome of centralized and unrestricted state power.

Those Christians who errantly view the modern state as God’s colleague, upholding part of His law, must face a double dilemma.¹ First, the Bible indicates that the state is generally evil, having a satanic origin, and often serves God by bringing terrestrial judgment upon people. Second, it is very rare (if not impossible) to find historical examples of states that have ever come close to upholding God’s law in the world. Given that the earthly institutions of God designed to expand His kingdom must at least resemble His ways and serve His cause, the state—which is eminently wayward—cannot fall into this category.

Consequently, Christian leaders are leading people astray who promote the modern state, in America or elsewhere, as a companion of the church. On the contrary, they should warn Christians about the evil nature of the state, about the statist schemes of Satan, and tell them to be on their guard against the state—one of the church’s most lethal enemies in history. Lamentably, only a few Christian leaders have been dutiful to proclaim this sort of warning.

Christian leaders must also be about the business of proclaiming God’s way of caring for the poor and needy, for promoting peace, and for defending ourselves against the intrusions of the state. Regrettably, rather than being active agents in transforming their culture, ignorant Christian leaders have been willing to abandon it to the mischief and folly of statists.

¹ I refer specifically to the adherents of the revitalized or reshaped divine right of kings perspective. Theonomists would never attribute such confidence to the modern state; even if they hope that one day it will become such an attendant of righteousness. Likewise, those pacifists who hold that the state is a competing kingdom against God’s kingdom would also cast a vote of no confidence in the modern state—for good reason. Regrettably, there are relatively few Christian leaders today who reject the divine right perspective. A discussion of these different perspectives may be found in my article “Christian Views on Rebellion.”

Originally published in The Times Examiner on October 19, 2005.

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The Evil Nature of the State

The state has been a vile nuisance for civilized men, and the Bible gives us no reason to believe its evil nature can be changed. The psalmist recognized that states legislate evil policies when he wrote: “Shall the throne of iniquity, which devises evil by law, have fellowship with You?” (Psalm 94:20). Historically, the state usually reigns by iniquity, stimulating and fomenting evil schemes. And, in the end, God will destroy the evil and “twisted” state, the beast from the sea (akin to the one mentioned in Revelation 13:1). As He says in Isaiah 27:1: “In that day the Lord with His severe sword, great and strong, will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent, Leviathan that twisted serpent; and He will slay the reptile that is in the sea.” Indeed, the Bible teaches that hell (Tophet) was “prepared” for the king (Isaiah 30:33), and designates the lake of fire as the ultimate end of earthly kings who defy God (Revelation 19:20).

With conviction, the Bible indicates that the state is always created according to God’s permissive will: “The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord, like the rivers of water; He turns it wherever He wishes” (Proverbs 21:1). By God’s wisdom, “kings reign, and rulers decree justice” (Proverbs 8:15). Indeed, “All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing; He does according to His will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth” (Daniel 4:34-37). Thus, even the most vicious and evil rulers are subject to God’s decree, even though their lust for greed and power fosters conscription, taxation, power brokering, and oppression—just as Samuel prophesied (1 Samuel 8:11-18).¹

Biblical accounts of public policy clearly indicate that state actions in the Bible were mostly evil, concurring with other historical manifestations over the last few thousand years. As I show in Bible and Government: Public Policy from a Christian Perspective, over 90% of the recorded acts of states (outside of the theocracy) were clearly evil. That is to say, public policies recorded in Scripture are usually perverse or opposed to God’s law and righteousness, or are directed against God’s people. “Summarizing the biblical data, we can conclude that non-theocratic state policy actions were evil 90.2% of the time. Theocratic ones were evil 60.3% of the time. Overall, state acts were evil 78.4% of the time.”²

The Bible does not support the popular notion that the state is generally a benign—if not benevolent— upholder of social order. The state has not generally been the guardian of God’s law or even an arbitrary selection of it. Moreover, the Bible hardly supports the notion that men have learned to govern themselves better over time—such that the evils of the past are less likely to be repeated in the future. On the contrary, the Bible teaches that the heart of man is the same in all ages, resulting in social decay.

Does history confirm the Bible’s doctrine regarding the nature of the state? Indeed, it does so emphatically! Throughout history, rulers have typically been malevolent and often cruel. Some have been hedonistic, while others have been sadistic. Some have been ideologues or masterful demagogues; others have been rapacious conquerors. These are the standout traits of power and authority throughout history.

Renowned economist Ludwig von Mises notes that interventionist public policy by states “has caused wars and civil wars, ruthless oppression of the masses by clusters of self-appointed dictators, economic depressions, mass unemployment, capital consumption, [and] famines.”³ For Mises, “collectivism is a doctrine of war, intolerance, and persecution” where the people “become mere soulless pawns in the hands of a monster.”⁴

The Bible substantiates this observation. “If you see the oppression of the poor, and the violent perversion of justice and righteousness in a province, do not marvel at the matter; for high official watches over high official, and higher officials are over them” (Ecclesiastes 5:8). Jesus Christ confirmed the vicious behavior of rulers too: “You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them” (Mark 10:42; cf. Matthew 20:25). The record of state abuses indicates that social learning has hardly improved the state—from the Roman Empire to the Dark Ages down to the present. The state remains the foremost enemy of humanity and, along with false religion, the foremost ally of Satan. Thus, the permanent satanic nature of the state presented in the Bible implies the futility of trying to “transform” it into a godly institution (under the dominion mandate of Genesis 1:26-27). Christians should not expect that a leopard will change its spots or that a poisoned spring will produce fresh water.

Footnotes:

¹ 1 Samuel 8:4-22: Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah, and said to him, “Look, you are old, and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now make us a king to judge us like all the nations.” But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, “Give us a king to judge us.” So Samuel prayed to the Lord. And the Lord said to Samuel, “Heed the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected Me, that I should not reign over them. According to all the works which they have done since the day that I brought them up out of Egypt, even to this day—with which they have forsaken Me and served other gods—so they are doing to you also. Now therefore, heed their voice. However, you shall solemnly forewarn them, and show them the behavior of the king who will reign over them.” So Samuel told all the words of the Lord to the people who asked him for a king. And he said, “This will be the behavior of the king who will reign over you: He will take your sons and appoint them for his own chariots and to be his horsemen, and some will run before his chariots. He will appoint captains over his thousands and captains over his fifties, will set some to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and some to make his weapons of war and equipment for his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers, cooks, and bakers. And he will take the best of your fields, your vineyards, and your olive groves, and give them to his servants. He will take a tenth of your grain and your vintage, and give it to his officers and servants. And he will take your male servants, your female servants, your finest young men, and your donkeys, and put them to his work. He will take a tenth of your sheep. And you will be his servants. And you will cry out in that day because of your king whom you have chosen for yourselves, and the Lord will not hear you in that day.” Nevertheless the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel; and they said, “No, but we will have a king over us, that we also may be like all the nations, and that our king may judge us and go out before us and fight our battles.” And Samuel heard all the words of the people, and he repeated them in the hearing of the Lord. So the Lord said to Samuel, “Heed their voice, and make them a king.” And Samuel said to the men of Israel, “Every man go to his city.”

² John Cobin (2003), Bible and Government: Public Policy from a Christian Perspective, Greenville, SC: Alertness Books, p. 98.

³ See Ludwig von Mises (1996 [1966/1949]), Human Action: A Treatise On Economics, fourth revised edition, Irvington-on-Hudson, New York: The Foundation for Economic Education, p. 855.

⁴ Ludwig von Mises, (1985/1957), Theory and History: An Interpretation of Social and Economic Evolution, Auburn, Alabama: The Ludwig von Mises Institute, p. 61.

Originally published in The Times Examiner on October 12, 2005.

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The State is Not Benevolent

Is the state run by Satan? What do we know about the nature of the state? According to the Bible, the state’s power comes from Satan through the “spirits of demons”. In Revelation 13:1-4,¹ “a beast rising up out of the sea” with “a blasphemous name” on his heads emerges to rule civil society. This ruler is empowered by “the dragon”, also “called the Devil and Satan” (Revelation 12:9, cf. 20:2), who gives him “his power, his throne, and great authority”. At the time of the writing of the book of Revelation, Domitian was likely Caesar, noted for the band of gold he wore on his head containing the blasphemous inscription “Dominus et Deus” (i.e., “Lord and God”).² Satan empowered this ruler “beast”, as he does all the “kings of the earth”.Revelation 16:14 (cf. 19:19) says that the “spirits of demons” emerging from this beast and Satan “go out to the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.” And the devil presently uses the state to do his bidding, including casting Christians into prison (Revelation 2:10)—as was the case when Peter and John were condemned for preaching the Gospel (Acts 5:17-29). Plainly, the nature of the state is satanic. Accordingly, when tempting Christ, the devil was probably not lying, and his claims were not exaggerated, when he said that he controls the state.

Then the devil, taking Him up on a high mountain, showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. And the devil said to Him, “All this authority I will give You, and their glory; for this has been delivered to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. Therefore, if You will worship before me, all will be Yours.” And Jesus answered and said to him, ‘Get behind Me, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve’.” (Luke 4:5-7)³

In Revelation 17:11-14 the connection between great states and the figurative beast is made plain, where the beast is identified as the eighth successive king. These beasts stand against the kingdom of God and will be cast into hell (Revelation 19:20-21). Therefore, the state can be generally viewed as an agent of the kingdom of Satan and empowered by the devil – even if it is ultimately ordained
by God (in the sense of Romans 13:1).

How then can the Bible say that states are “ordained” or “appointed” by God to be his “ministers” (Romans 13:1-2, 4, 6)? Briefly, divine appointment to God’s service does not imply that the person or institution appointed is holy or godly. After all, Satan himself is ordained by God, and his actions are bounded by Providence (e.g., as the Bible describes in Job’s trials and the protecting of Peter from being sifted “as wheat” by the devil in Luke 22:31).4 The state is ordained by God but the Bible indicates that its most intimate relationship is with the devil (Revelation 18:9), and the state has generally served Satan’s evil designs throughout history, even if God ultimately directs the state and disposes of it as He wills.

The satanic nexus with the state is also described or implied in Daniel 10:13, Ezekiel 28:12-19, and Revelation 17:1-7. In these passages, Satan is called “the prince of kingdom of Persia” and the “King of Tyre”. Plus, the “kings of the earth” are described as having an intimate and illicit relationship with Satan by way of his “scarlet beast” and the “woman” who is carried by it. So once again we find a direct link between Satan and the earthly rulers that God ordains. The devil certainly controlled these kings, assuming they were historical figures. Perhaps he even possessed them. Hence, we have more evidence to suggest that the state may credibly be considered part of the kingdom of Satan, and only ordained by God in the sense that the devil himself is ordained by God – to fulfill His purposes and to glorify Him.

The Scriptures indicate that the state is often a “minister” of judgment ordained by God (cf. Isaiah 3:4-5, 12-15). To varying degrees, in each judgment situation, the state becomes “the rod” of God’s “anger” and “the staff” of His “indignation” (Isaiah 10:5). It receives a “charge” from God to punish the people who are objects of His terrestrial “wrath” (Isaiah 10:6). The Bible says that Lord himself brings
“calamity” on people (Isaiah 45:7). The state is often a judgment against the people over which it rules (particularly outside of the theocracy of Judah), although God has also used the state to judge foreigners during the Old Testament theocratic kingdom.⁵ Yet the states that serve God in this way are often at least as wicked as the ones they judge, showing that not all of God’s ordained servants (cf. Romans 13:4) are upright in character. Casting aside popular myths to the contrary, the state’s evil nature and bad character are realities to be expected.

¹ Good Protestant hermeneutics mandates that doctrine should primarily be derived from didactical parts of Scripture such as the law, the parables of Christ, and the epistles or decrees of the Apostles. Other revelation should be either supportive or secondary in forming doctrine, having its best purpose to clarify, enhance, or bolster principles. The book of Revelation is an inspired portion of the Scriptures, and therefore “profitable for doctrine” (2 Timothy 3:16), with this kind of supportive role. It contains many passages that relate to the state, and thus is helpful in forming a biblical understanding of public policy.

² See Herman Hoeksema (1969), Behold He Cometh: An Exposition of the Book of Revelation, Reformed Free Publishing Association: Grand Rapids, Michigan, pp. 451ff.

³ The parallel passage in Matthew 4:8-11 states: “Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to Him, ‘All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.’ Then Jesus said to him, ‘Away with you, Satan! For it is written, “You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve.”‘ Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.”

⁴ The Bible is replete with examples of this fact. Ungodly Old Testament era kings were God’s controlled servants, including Pharaoh (Exodus 4:21), the Assyrian king (Ezra 6:22), Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon (Jeremiah 43:10), and Cyrus king of Persia (Isaiah 44:28; 45:1; 2 Chronicles 36:22; Ezra 1:1). The demons had to ask Christ’s permission to be cast into the swine (Matthew 8:31) instead of the “dry places” (Matthew 12:43; Luke 11:24). Satan is said to be “bound for a thousand years” by God’s angel (Revelation 20:2). God used Michael the archangel to withstand the devil in his wiles (Daniel 10:13; Jude 1:9).

⁵ Sometimes a state is more evil than the people it afflicts (Isaiah 10:10, Habakkuk 1:4-11) but God uses it for judgment nonetheless.

Originally published in The Times Examiner on October 5, 2005 as “The Nature of the State: Part 1″.

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Is the State Run by Satan?

Albert Jay Nock (1870-1947), although relatively obscure today, was one of the foremost journalists and political philosophers of his day. He founded what would become The Freeman (see www.fee.org for details) in the early 1920s—one of the strongest and most consistent pieces of advocacy journalism for liberty and free markets available. Jeffrey A. Tucker praises Nock’s sophistication and genius in his tribute: Albert Jay Nock, Forgotten Man of the Right (2002). “The phrase Man of Letters is thrown around casually these days, but A.J. Nock was the real thing. Born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, he was homeschooled from the earliest age in Greek and Latin, unbelievably well read in every field, a natural aristocrat in the best sense of that term. He combined an old-world cultural sense (he despised popular culture) and a political anarchism which saw the State as the enemy of everything that is civilized, beautiful, and true. And he applied this principle consistently in opposition to welfare, government-managed economies, consolidation, and, above all else, war.”In his Memoirs of a Superfluous Man (1943), Nock writes about the anomalous nature of government: “We were supposed to respect our government and its laws, yet by all accounts those who were charged with the conduct of government and the making of its laws were most dreadful swine; indeed, the very conditions of their tenure precluded their being anything else.” Nock was altogether discomfited by the reality of the state. He saw it as a great evil in the world; tragically unavoidable and, in a nearly fatalistic sense, the manifest, gloomy downfall of all great civilizations. He envisaged that the rise of state power would gradually reduce the great roads of New England to the desolate, overgrown Roman roads of Old England.

In his classic essay Our Enemy, The State (1935), Nock develops his thesis that there is a great difference between government, which is established by men to protect “social power” and peaceful, mutually-beneficial cooperation, and the state. The state is the ever-growing mutation of government that results in the favor-brokering, benefit-peddling, business-protecting nuisance that now plagues modern society. On the one hand, men have natural rights, antecedent to the creation of government, that are to be protected by the collective power of government. As Thomas Jefferson put it, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” On the other hand, states are cancerous outgrowths that thrive by plundering inalienable rights. States are parasites and predators that dole out privileges and siphon off prosperity through taxes and regulation.

Nock says: “At the outset of his pamphlet called Common Sense, [Thomas] Paine draws a distinction between society and government. While society in any state is a blessing, he says, ‘government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.’ In another place, he speaks of government as ‘a mode rendered necessary by the inability of moral virtue to govern the world.’” Government might originate by the common understanding and agreement of society aimed at securing “freedom and security”. But government power should be limited to these two elements and should never degenerate into any “positive intervention upon the individual, but only a negative intervention.” For Nock, “the whole business of government” should be to protect our inalienable rights and nothing more.

Nock is right. The vision of the American Founders could not have been clearer. Yet the defiant state has materialized—despite the Founders’ good intentions—originating “in conquest and confiscation.” The resulting anti-social order of the state and its administrators would have to be judged by ethics and common law as “indistinguishable from a professional-criminal class.” Nock continues: “So far from encouraging a wholesome development of social power, it has invariably, as [James] Madison said, turned every contingency into a resource for depleting social power and enhancing State power. As Dr. Sigmund Freud has observed, it can not even be said that the State has ever shown any disposition to suppress crime, but only to safeguard its own monopoly of crime…with unconscionable ruthlessness. Taking the State wherever found, striking into its history at any point, one sees no way to differentiate the activities of its founders, administrators and beneficiaries from those of a professional-criminal class.”

If liberty-lovers adopt a Nockian view of the state, they are left with no alternative than to recognize that the ideal of government envisioned by the Founders has been obliterated. The mutant American state has become—far more than when Nock wrote 70 years ago—no different than a band of thugs. If the right of self-defense means anything, and the principles of Jefferson are still valid, the destruction of the American state as it presently stands, and its replacement with a government congruent with the vision of the Founders, is both justified and a worthy objective of those who love liberty.

Originally published in The Times Examiner on January 19, 2005.

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Government vs. The State

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I absolutely despise tax season. This year especially. I made less money this year and yet paid more to the State.

And what for?

So a run-amok military can go bomb Libya, Iraq, and Afghanistan in the name of "freedom" and "democracy"?

So I can watch the economy dissolve while the Wall Street banksters enrich themselves with printed money from the Fed and inflate us to death?

So I am "protected" from "harm" by thugs in uniforms from the perils of harmless immigrants and the devil weed?

So I can entertain myself with the antics of politicians (if only that were all I had to worry about)?

So I get my precious interstate system, education system, welfare system, and the like?

So the alphabet soup bureaucracy "regulates" my health, wealth, food, drugs, and internet?

I have to ask, is it worth the cost?

Never. But you did get what you bargained for.

How foolish that you, America, would stoop so low. This government of lawlessness deserves no anthem, no salute, no pledge, no respect. Turn your back on it.

—–

For more on why I hate thievery, I mean taxes, check out my article series 10 Things I Hate About Taxes.

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Ode to Tax Season 2011